Searching for a Ball 

When you have to look in thick rough, long grass, bushes or other questionable areas in order to find a ball, the Rules give you a lot of leeway. You can move and bend stuff, but there is one key thing you cannot do:

• Don’t improve the conditions affecting the stroke beyond what is reasonable for a fair search.

A fair search actually includes a lot you might normally not be allowed to do around the ball. You may move or bend long grass, bushes, tree branches and other growing or attached natural objects. You may even move sand and water to find the ball. In general, your searching should not change the situation of the ball, but so long as you are fairly searching, even if the conditions affecting the stroke are slightly altered, that’s ok. There is one change that must be corrected:

• If sand affecting the lie of a player’s ball is moved to find or identify the ball, you are required to re-create the original lie in the sand. If the ball was originally completely covered by sand, you are entitled to leave a small portion of the ball visible so that you do not lose the ball again.